agogelogs | [OPEN] Oh, in dreams I have watched it spin

Jon had never been warm at the Wall. If he were awake, he would find it strange that he's warm now.

The border of the forest here at Castle Black is kept a distance from the Wall itself, so a man standing 700 feet high at the top can see the edge of the woods, can see rangers returning or wildlings threatening an attack, and so that no one can climb it. And it's a black and white world from this high up, and blue, and green: snow, ice, and trees as far as the eye can see.

Now there's the red and gold and orange of fire in the night, and horns and howling and a steady pulse of war drums coming from the woods. Tiny figures break from the tree line, armed with spears and bows and axes, some riding in bone chariots… and there are bigger figures too. From up here, even the giants look small.

“Stand fast,” he calls to his brothers, though it seems hardly possible to shout loud enough. “Throw them back. Flame,” he cried, “feed them flame,” but there's no one to pay heed.

They are all gone. They have abandoned me.

Burning shafts of arrows hiss upward, trailing tongues of fire. “Snow,” an eagle cries, as enemies scuttle up the ice like spiders. Jon is armored in black ice, but his blade burns red in his fist and he feels as warm as he ever has.

As the dead men reach the top of the Wall he sends them down to die again. He slays an old man and a young boy, a giant, a young woman with blue eyes and thick red hair. Before she falls, he recognizes her, but as hard as he tries to say her name, as much dismay as it obviously causes him to see her there, he can't.

The world dissolves into a red mist. Jon stabs and slashes and cuts and kicks. He hacks down more people, some he recognizes as friends, some of whom he knows aren't dead at all. Davos Seaworth goes as surely as Ramsay Bolton does. Tyrion Lannister follows Alliser Thorne. A Dothraki screamer with glowing blue eyes and torn skin follows the rest.

A dragon cries overhead, circling in the night. The sounds below grow faint as it goes on.

Something draws him to look down the wall, and he sees it: a king made of ice with a dead heart of ice, with an ice-bone crown, with the power to make it all start again even if it seems to be ending. The king approaches him, approaches you, step by slow step, almost unconcerned. Slowly, the sounds of war below awaken again with his progress.

"I can't stop it," Jon says, desperately, with no one to hear him but you.

[Credit: Parts of this dream and its overall shape are lifted directly from A Dance With Dragons, but not all of it.]

Edited 2017-12-24 05:10 (UTC)

The winds howl--or they should, this high up, but they don't. Instead, they whip at her clothing, Meereenese silks long since abandoned. They whip at her hair, her cheeks--and yet she is not cold.

It would be beautiful, to gaze upon the world from this height. Much akin to flying on Drogon's back, with surroundings transforming into minuscule specs, like little dolls and wooden pieces for a child to create his or her own scene.

It would be beautiful, to be this close to the moon... were it not for the haunting war horns further ahead. Snow and ice crackle beneath her boots as she steps along a well-worn path. Guards do not flank her; sentries do not line the walkway, save for one figure further ahead.

Jon.

She's just about to call his name, relief upon seeing him near palpable. Or it was. Sinking fear causes her heart to skitter when she realizes he fights. Old, young--a beautiful woman with haunting blue eyes and a snarl on her lips. She tumbles over the side, down, down down... and the look on Jon's face makes her think she shattered his heart before her fall. It gives Dany pause. Hesitation to shouting his name.

Ser Davos. Lord Tyrion. One of her Dothraki. All with haunting eyes like the redhead. She grips her gun tightly, not realizing when she'd reached for one, not realizing when she'd obtained it, nor how it possible she did.

"Stop what?" It? The attack? The bodies he knocks back down? Something else? She looks down as he does, and amidst the mass of bodies, one stands out. Haunting eyes. A passive visage. A large spear of ice in his hand.

The Night King. Is that what he truly looks like? Is this the entity she'd encountered in a time not yet lived? The one who stole from her? It doesn't matter; a dragon's roar mutes her fear, has her rushing closer to the edge and Jon as she gazes beyond. Beyond the masses of bodies below, beyond the forest of trees, up, up into the night sky, where her child's body circles. But--but there's something wrong. Something wrong with him. He does not strike their foes.

Soon, there are two answering cries. Shadowed silhouettes soaring overhead. One swoops downward, a funnel of flame decimating the front ranks before Rhaegal breaks from his dive and flaps upward. Drogon ignores the masses below, bellowing a roar she's never heard--anger, grief, betrayal--and crashes head on with Viserion. Viserion.

"Don't!" she yells to her children. "Stop it!"

They ignore her. The bodies continue to crawl up the wall, much like Irriella does her arm when beckoned. The next one which threatens to land before them receives a bullet in its throat; she nearly drops the gun when dark, congealed blood oozes from the hole, from the creature's mouth.

"How do we destroy it?"

He turns to look at her then, and when he sees her, his expression is complicated: relief that he's not alone, pleasure that it's her, and much more than anything, dismay for the same reason. She will die here. She will die if he makes even the slightest misstep.

And over their heads, dragons are fighting. Two of them -- Drogon and the one that has been lost -- tangle in the air, and the dead one shoots flame the blue of the wights' eyes. He'd thought that nothing could be more sickening and angering than the way the dragon died, but this surpasses it.

There's nothing he can do about the dragons now: he can't stop a wight dragon from here and he can't stop the other two from fighting it. Meanwhile, more figures climb the walls. It doesn't matter if Daenerys puts a bullet in the throat of a wight... bullets aren't made of dragonglass or Valyrian steel.

"I don't know how to destroy it. Drogon, or Longclaw... Lightbringer... I don't know. It doesn't matter what the Red Woman says, I'm not The Prince That -- "

Something reaches for her, and with a lunge and a crunching swipe, he kills it, then uses his foot to kick it off of the length of his sword and back down the wall.

[OOC note: I keep forgetting to say it, but chronologically, this thread follows more or less after this one! Which is NSFW in later parts.]

Edited 2017-12-29 03:56 (UTC)

He wouldn't have to fight this alone. Not that all their talks come to mind--no, she's too busy frowning, attention flicking from Jon and to Drogon, Rhaegal, and Viserion again. Ear-splitting roars which settle in her bones. Blue and orange flames, creating bright explosions when they connect. The urge to retch grows stronger by the second.

Bone crunches, and she's jerking back. Stupid to look away. The more immediate threat was literally right in front of them... not her dragons.

"--was promised can bring the dawn." Looking at him now, she's far too pale. The Red Priestess from Asshai--Melisandre, she called herself. She'd spoken highly of Jon, pleading Dany to meet the King in the North. Faintly: "It's the prince or princess."

Prophecies. They're dangerous things to believe in, isn't that what she'd been told? The blast from her gun echoes, the knock-back from the bullet's impact sending another corpse over the edge before it can pull itself up.

She reaches for him, fingers digging into the thickness of his top, buffered by his cloak. They were... they were going to die if it was the two of them against an entire army. She was no warrior, not like him. Her only power was battling in the skies as she watched him, swallowing past the lump in her throat as she does.

"We have--" Ice crunching has her looking away... only to meet the gaze of the Night King. No longer hundreds of feet below them, but standing a foot or two away. Cold, dead eyes. Expressionless. He's reaching for them, and her grip on Jon's arm tightens. She can't move. Can't look away. Drogon roars and the pained sound of Rhaegal echoes in her ears and--

Why can't she can't move?!

Not everyone climbing is a wight, but some of the ones that fall seem to begin to climb again with eyes glowing blue. Never mind fighting all of these people alone: how are they meant to kill all of them time and again, whether he does it alone or Daenerys helps him?

He can feel her fingers on his arm through the armor. They push through it as though it's soft.

When he hears the ice crunching closer to them than anyone should be, his head whips around, and when he sees the Night King, so near to him that their final battle seems imminent and inevitable, he feels cold for the first time. The dragons shriek in the sky and his lover's fingers grip his arm tightly, but not even the unnatural warmth can survive the Night King's presence.

The chill begins to hurt, begins to freeze him from the heart outward. The armor begins to solidify again so he can't move, and Jon struggles against it, but he --

Wakes up like a shot, narrowly avoiding hitting his head on the ceiling of his chamber, and rustling Daenerys, whose head had been pillowed on his chest.

"I had a bad dream," he says, hoarse.

I had a bad dream, he says as she's jostled awake with a gasp. Dead eyes haunt her as she struggles to sit up, her limbs sluggish not with sleep, but the sensation of being weighed down by ice. Filling her fingers, hands, arms... and the same with her legs. The room is warm. She is warm, especially curled against him.

There's a tremble to her hands as she presses to her knees and reaches for him. One around his shoulders to pull him into a tight hug, the other to cradle the back of his head.

"I did, as well," she whispers. If she closes her eyes, the images remain. She doesn't close her eyes. "We were at the Wall, I think."

He lets himself be hugged and likes the comfort of her hand against his head, but his limbs feel as sluggish, and it takes a moment for him to put his arms around her.

When she speaks, he pulls back and looks at her, surprised.

"At the Wall. You had a gun. The dragons were fighting each other in the air.

"I was always alone before, in that dream, and there were no dragons... just people climbing the walls. It seemed like it would never end."

Her hands slip from around him, and she settles back; his surprise is mirrored.

"Viserion was--" She shakes her head, something desperate entering her gaze. "You saw him die. He couldn't..."

...Could he? But no, she doesn't know how the dead work, and how could it possible affect a dragon in the same way? No, no this is not possible, so she focuses instead on what he speaks of.

"How often have you dreamt it? There were people we knew with the corpses, those not dead."

A redhead.

"Not often. I don't understand the armor, but maybe I was thinking of dragonglass. The sword... it's a little like Lord Beric's sword, but it wasn't like Longclaw."

He doesn't remember just now that Daenerys hasn't yet met Beric Dondarrion.

"Viserion went under the water, where the dead can't go. I'd fear that he would become a wight... there are bear wights and mammoth wights... but I know they can't touch him there."

His hand goes up into his hair, which is loose, to push it back from his face as he frowns.

"It seemed at first like I was killing everyone I knew but you."

"How often since coming here?" She's no idea what the Night King or even the wall would look like. And how would she share a dream with him? He's appeared in a number of her dreams, some morphed memories of her past, and others strange and in settings she imagines were part of his life. Also morphed and dream-like. But this, this was far too real. "I don't know who lord Beric is, Jon."

This is not her room, though it is her assigned sleeping quarters. With a quiet sigh, she shifts around so that they're sitting side by side, and she tugs the blanket up to tuck beneath her arms. Nakedness never bothers her, but tonight, it makes her feel far too exposed.

"So he's spared from that. Good." She sounds tired. She is tired. "You didn't kill me in your other dreams?"

"Coming to BASE, or finding myself with COST? I had it once in Jerusalem."

He drags his hand from his hair to scrub it against his eyes.

"I didn't kill you. Never you. And Lord Beric... he has a flaming sword." As if that explains it all; as if he hasn't killed what now feels like a hundred other people, in his dreams and out of them.

[OOC note: also I am a fool, they are in Dany's room, and he did not almost hit his head upon awaking, because there's actually clearance in that room.]

Edited 2017-12-31 04:01 (UTC)

"Never since?" How often did he have it in their world? Gods, to wake up alone from that sort of dream...

She presses her cheek to his shoulder. Her own hair is a tangled mess, loose as it is. Not worth the effort of taming it at this point. If they fall back asleep, would the dream haunt them again? Would it be a more peaceful sleep?

"Who else did you know?" How many of those faces were people he knew? Gods, she hopes not all of them. "Save the ones we know."

He leans his head against hers when she rests her cheek against his shoulder. That's a comfort, inasmuch as anything is a comfort, and if she saw everything he dreamed, then comfort is a thing they can probably both use right now.

"Never since. Some of them were my old brothers in the Watch. Some of them were wildlings." After hesitation, he adds, "Friends. My old steward."

There's one person he's conspicuously not mentioning, and he feels something inside him capitulate. He knows about Drogo -- he's met Drogo.

"The girl... did you see her?"

Edited 2017-12-31 05:25 (UTC)

It's not the only comfort. Her hand soon finds his, fingers curling around him in a familiar grip. They aren't tangled together as they've been during other nights, to the point where it was difficult to discern where one began and the other ended, and it's likely a good thing right now. She needs focus, not distractions, and he's proven to be very distracting whilst naked.

"The redhead?"

So she did see her.

He makes a little noise of agreement, and a few seconds pass before he collects his thoughts enough to say more.

"Ygritte."

Then, after another few seconds, "I told you once, I was sent to spy amongst the Free Folk. They didn't like Crows. I was just eighteen or so."

Ygritte. A Wildling girl he'd met when he was still a boy learning the ways of the world, in some respects. Not all that different from her time with the Dothraki, is it? No, he doesn't say as much, but she recalls their other conversation, so many weeks ago.

She shifts, releasing his hand to catch his cheek, coaxing him to look at her. If he does, she'll reach up to tuck wayward curls behind his ear, her touch painfully gentle--much like her eyes.

"What happened?"

He looks up at her, but he's hesitant, and without the gentle coaxing, he probably wouldn't. He'd continue to stare down past the surface of the blanket. As it is, his expression is troubled. He might have told Daenerys more of this in time -- or he might not have. He might have kept it locked away forever.

"I was told to do whatever they asked of me. The first thing I had to do was kill a man I respected, on his own command, to prove I was a turncloak. We'd captured Ygritte... she was a sentinel and I was meant to kill her to keep her from alerting her people, but I couldn't. The Halfhand and I wound up getting captured by her people in return."

She couldn't blame him if he had. It's not easy to talk about the past, sometimes. What good does it do, save for dredge up memories best left forgotten?

We don't have to talk about her, she's about to tell him, all because of a simple look. He's told her some of this already; there must be a 'but...' in there, somewhere. We were captured by her people in turn, but--but what? She thinks she knows. He had to prove he was no longer a Crow, hadn't he? Revoke his vows.

A fierce wave of protectiveness roars to life in her chest. She didn't know him when she was seventeen or eighteen. She'd had her own struggles, her own people to lead. But, but, but. There's always a but.

She's cupping both his cheeks now, her eyes bright. "You did what was necessary to survive."

"I did." The look in her eyes is melting, and he melts a little along with it, presses one side of his face into her hand. Does she understand what that really meant, and does she understand that, even so, it's still an excuse, at least half horseshit?

"I did whatever it took. But some of it was easier to do than the rest of it. Killing the Halfhand was... he was the first man I ever killed, the first living one. If I'd failed after that in the task he had set me, he'd have died for nothing.

"Breaking my vows with Ygritte wasn't hard at all."

Affection warms her gaze due to the motion. There and gone, as she listens to what he says.

"You don't enjoy killing." She remembers. He'd said so at Dragonstone. "Of course that was hard, someone you knew?"

It wasn't easy to kill Drogo. Gods, it's never easy. Even ordering the murders of those with the Lannisters who directly stood in opposition to her... But this is not about her, and he's seen far, far too many battles. And all the faces at the Wall. If even half of those were people he knew who were now dead?

If only she could wrap her arms around him, hug him close, and will his hauntedness away.

"She was beautiful." Not that it's an excuse. Drogo was handsome. Daario was handsome. Jon is handsome. It doesn't matter. Looks are so very fleeting, and he was a young man, thrown into a different life. "Did you love her?"

"I don't know if she was beautiful. I thought at first that she wasn't... that she was common... then I thought that she was, more and more every day."

A pause, and he presses his lips together. He's made the decision to tell her everything, but it still doesn't want to flow out of him: it comes out in bits and pieces, each one tugged past his reluctance to speak of it.

Sam and Tormund are the only other people who really know any of it.

"I loved her. I left her anyway, when I could, to go back to Castle Black and warn them that her people were planning to attack." A low, uncertain laugh. "She put three arrows in me. One in my leg, two in my back. And then some of the officers at Castle Black wanted to hang me for a traitor."

He loved her, she concludes, when he speaks of how she grew more and more beautiful each day. He confirms it moments later, but during that pause, her thoughts twist inward: nothing ugly manifests at the idea of him loving someone else. She thought it would. She thought, because this is so sweeping and all-encompassing, what they share, that she would resemble the dragon card in the deck she'd received.

The girl is dead. How would she feel if their positions were reversed, and it was not Drogo who walked the halls, but Ygritte?

"She shot you." There's disbelief in her tone. Indignance on his behalf. "And they viewed you a traitor because you fought to survive? Even despite you warning them?"

She doesn't like Ygritte very much, after all.

Jon speaks slowly when he answers her, but the words themselves come out with less difficulty now.

"There was no record of the Halfhand's orders, no proof that I hadn't truly turned. I freely admitted to breaking my vows with Ygritte, and the master-at-arms at Castle Black had hated me almost from our first meeting, but Maester Aemon spoke for me. He saved my life... more than once.

"And why would I have gone back there to warn them if-- well. It doesn't matter very much anymore. I could have stayed with her, I could have broken my vows in truth, but if I had, I would have died with her."

He leans back against the wall, encouraging Daenerys to follow and rest against his chest.

"And she is dead. She died..." (a breath, and he frowns), "... when her people attacked the castle. You have to understand, it isn't defensible from the south. The Watch takes no part in the kingdom's wars."

She huffs an exhale, disgruntlement diminishing in painfully slow increments... flaring to life upon mention of the master-at-arms, and soothed upon mention of her great-uncle. If only she could have met the man. If only she could thank him for what he did, even if he'd done it for Jon. If he hadn't, where would Jon be, today?

It's stupid, is what it is. Holding these grudges, disliking someone for no reason.

"I learned to love my chains," she carefully says, not following him right away, but instead allowing her fingers to purposefully trail down his chest. She regards the puckered scars there, a troubled look flickering in her gaze, gone as her palm settles on his thigh. The blankets hide his skin from view. No way to find the scar, so she looks him in the eye. "Yours freed you in some ways, and tightened around you in others."

I understand, is what she means to tell him with that. So, so much more than she could ever articulate. A dead lover, a heart still aching over the memory, as much as she can, she understands. And could she not also relate to Ygritte in some ways, as well? Granted, she hadn't shot Jorah with arrows.

With a sigh, she scoots closer to him, tugging the blanket with her as she rests against his chest. He's warm and alive and he's home.

"I'm sorry it all happened that way. Were you with her when she--" Her tongue darts out to dampen her lips. "--when she fell?"

His tongue feels thick again, remembering it, and leaden; he's never really spoken of it before.

He hadn't killed Ygritte, and he hadn't really even been responsible for her death, but he'd still felt guilty for it. The choice had been to betray her love or to betray everything he'd ever known and everything he was, even his father's memory, and the faith that people like the Old Bear and Maester Aemon and Qhorin Halfhand had had in him. So he had betrayed her love. The fact that it was the better choice didn't make it any less a betrayal, and it didn't make her any less dead.

He could have been free, but not with honor, and not for long.

"She died in my arms. I took her body north of the Wall and burned it."

I. FOEMEN

cw: gore and death

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